The 10 Creepiest Diets in the World

Food: You can’t live without it ... and it’s starting to seem like you can’t live with it either. People make various choices about what kind of nutrition they put in their mouth and some of those choices are straight up disgusting. In this slideshow, we’ll share ten of the creepiest diets we’ve ever heard of.

Raw Meat Diet

Derek Nance of Lexington, Kentucky, started experiencing adverse reactions to food six years ago, and eventually he eliminated everything from his diet except raw meat — mostly lamb that he gets from a local slaughterhouse. He eats every part of the animal, from the bone marrow to the organ meat, and he lets cuts of it ripen in the fridge for a while to make it easier to digest. What's even more disgusting is that Nance has also given up toothpaste, choosing to brush his teeth with animal fat. Most amazingly, he’s in a committed relationship with his vegan girlfriend.

Food: You can’t live without it ... and it’s starting to seem like you can’t live with it either. People make various choices about what kind of nutrition they put in their mouth and some of those choices are straight up disgusting. In this slideshow, we’ll share ten of the creepiest diets we’ve ever heard of.

Raw Meat Diet

Derek Nance of Lexington, Kentucky, started experiencing adverse reactions to food six years ago, and eventually he eliminated everything from his diet except raw meat — mostly lamb that he gets from a local slaughterhouse. He eats every part of the animal, from the bone marrow to the organ meat, and he lets cuts of it ripen in the fridge for a while to make it easier to digest. What's even more disgusting is that Nance has also given up toothpaste, choosing to brush his teeth with animal fat. Most amazingly, he’s in a committed relationship with his vegan girlfriend.

We all know that pregnancy makes women crave some pretty weird things, but this takes the cake. Kelly-Marie Pearce, of Wolverhampton, England, started chowing down on sandwiches made from packed sand between two kitchen sponges when she was pregnant with her son Lucian. Pearce would toss down as many as 20 of these absolutely disgusting meals every day, and amazingly she doesn’t seem to have suffered any adverse health effects from it. Now that she’s not pregnant, she no longer eats sand and sponges, but she hasn’t ruled out the possibility of trying them again if she gets a third baby in her belly.

We all know that pregnancy makes women crave some pretty weird things, but this takes the cake. Kelly-Marie Pearce, of Wolverhampton, England, started chowing down on sandwiches made from packed sand between two kitchen sponges when she was pregnant with her son Lucian. Pearce would toss down as many as 20 of these absolutely disgusting meals every day, and amazingly she doesn’t seem to have suffered any adverse health effects from it. Now that she’s not pregnant, she no longer eats sand and sponges, but she hasn’t ruled out the possibility of trying them again if she gets a third baby in her belly.

Sometimes it takes a chance encounter to establish a truly bizarre diet. Indian man Gangarum Gautam first idly picked up a blade of grass and chewed on it at the age of seven, only to discover that he really enjoyed the taste. Over the next 40 years, Gautam slowly began replacing other foods with grass until it became all he ate. His local municipality allows him to graze freely in local parks, where he chows down nearly a half a pound a day. Although it’s not really hurting anybody, his weird diet has broken up two of his marriages.

Sometimes it takes a chance encounter to establish a truly bizarre diet. Indian man Gangarum Gautam first idly picked up a blade of grass and chewed on it at the age of seven, only to discover that he really enjoyed the taste. Over the next 40 years, Gautam slowly began replacing other foods with grass until it became all he ate. His local municipality allows him to graze freely in local parks, where he chows down nearly a half a pound a day. Although it’s not really hurting anybody, his weird diet has broken up two of his marriages.

Meat is cheaper now than it’s been at any point in American history, so you wouldn’t think that hungry people would have to turn to roadkill to survive. But British man Arthur Boyt has been chowing down on street meat for decades. The retired biologist scrapes all kinds of dead animals off the streets of Cornwall and cooks them up. He’s especially fond of the flavor of Labrador Retrievers, comparing them to lamb. If you’re curious, he’s even published cookbooks of his roadkill recipes.

Meat is cheaper now than it’s been at any point in American history, so you wouldn’t think that hungry people would have to turn to roadkill to survive. But British man Arthur Boyt has been chowing down on street meat for decades. The retired biologist scrapes all kinds of dead animals off the streets of Cornwall and cooks them up. He’s especially fond of the flavor of Labrador Retrievers, comparing them to lamb. If you’re curious, he’s even published cookbooks of his roadkill recipes.

British woman Debbie Taylor makes nutritious meals every day for her 10-year-old son, but when it’s her turn to eat she goes to the cupboard and opens a pack of beef-flavored Monster Munch corn chips. The British brand is all Taylor has eaten for the past five years. Psychologists believe that her intense food fixations stem from being teased and bullied for eating disorders as a child. She says that when she’s confronted with normal foods she becomes nauseous and can’t imagine ever trying to eat them, which makes going to restaurants very awkward.

British woman Debbie Taylor makes nutritious meals every day for her 10-year-old son, but when it’s her turn to eat she goes to the cupboard and opens a pack of beef-flavored Monster Munch corn chips. The British brand is all Taylor has eaten for the past five years. Psychologists believe that her intense food fixations stem from being teased and bullied for eating disorders as a child. She says that when she’s confronted with normal foods she becomes nauseous and can’t imagine ever trying to eat them, which makes going to restaurants very awkward.

Candy is delicious, but if you eat too much of it you’ll die, right? Don’t tell that to Keith Sorrell, who has subsisted on nothing but Mars bars for 17 years. Sorrell, a printer, typically eats a dozen a day, washing them down with orange juice for vitamin C. He also takes multivitamins, but doctors advise him that not consuming any fiber could be wreaking havoc on his gastrointestinal tract. When he goes out to clubs, he drinks Mars milkshakes blended with vodka. I’m sure bartenders love having to make those.

Candy is delicious, but if you eat too much of it you’ll die, right? Don’t tell that to Keith Sorrell, who has subsisted on nothing but Mars bars for 17 years. Sorrell, a printer, typically eats a dozen a day, washing them down with orange juice for vitamin C. He also takes multivitamins, but doctors advise him that not consuming any fiber could be wreaking havoc on his gastrointestinal tract. When he goes out to clubs, he drinks Mars milkshakes blended with vodka. I’m sure bartenders love having to make those.

There are few things in this world scarier than a bride before her wedding, especially if she’s trying to lose weight. A horrifying new diet catering to those demented souls has recently become popular. Called the K-E or “feeding tube” diet, a tube is inserted into the nose and run down through the stomach. A constant slow drip of protein and fat mixed with water is delivered down that tube, and the dieter eats no other solid foods. At around 800 calories a day, the mixture induces the rapid fat-burning known as ketosis, with reported losses of as much as 20 pounds in 10 days. Doctors say the main side effects are bad breath and constipation.

There are few things in this world scarier than a bride before her wedding, especially if she’s trying to lose weight. A horrifying new diet catering to those demented souls has recently become popular. Called the K-E or “feeding tube” diet, a tube is inserted into the nose and run down through the stomach. A constant slow drip of protein and fat mixed with water is delivered down that tube, and the dieter eats no other solid foods. At around 800 calories a day, the mixture induces the rapid fat-burning known as ketosis, with reported losses of as much as 20 pounds in 10 days. Doctors say the main side effects are bad breath and constipation.

People have all kinds of deranged ideas about weight loss. Take the case of Maxine Hobson, a 50-year-old British woman who thought that she could drop the pounds by eating nothing but Swiss rolls. If you’re not familiar, a Swiss roll is a thin sponge cake rolled around a jelly filling into a spiral shape, and Hobson was eating as much as two feet of the junk food on a daily basis. She rationalized it by thinking she was saving calories by not eating anything else. In nine months, she packed on a staggering 112 pounds of unhealthy fat before realizing the intense error of her ways.

People have all kinds of deranged ideas about weight loss. Take the case of Maxine Hobson, a 50-year-old British woman who thought that she could drop the pounds by eating nothing but Swiss rolls. If you’re not familiar, a Swiss roll is a thin sponge cake rolled around a jelly filling into a spiral shape, and Hobson was eating as much as two feet of the junk food on a daily basis. She rationalized it by thinking she was saving calories by not eating anything else. In nine months, she packed on a staggering 112 pounds of unhealthy fat before realizing the intense error of her ways.

Georgi Readman has been eating nothing but instant ramen noodles from the age of five, with nary a vegetable or cut of meat to mix things up. She can’t even handle the sight of other kinds of food touching her ramen bowl. Now 18, doctors say that her “selective eating disorder” has wreaked unimaginable havoc on her body. Malnourishment has stunted her growth at five foot three and just 98 pounds, and she has the overall health of a woman in her nineties.

Georgi Readman has been eating nothing but instant ramen noodles from the age of five, with nary a vegetable or cut of meat to mix things up. She can’t even handle the sight of other kinds of food touching her ramen bowl. Now 18, doctors say that her “selective eating disorder” has wreaked unimaginable havoc on her body. Malnourishment has stunted her growth at five foot three and just 98 pounds, and she has the overall health of a woman in her nineties.

Let’s close this list with a creepy diet that actually seems to have worked. Neil King was a Halstead man who was told to diet after his weight ballooned to 420 pounds. When his doctor told him he was at risk for bowel cancer, King cut out almost every aspect of his traditional English breakfast but one — baked beans. He ate beans for breakfast, lunch and dinner, sometimes with a little rice or potato — and nothing else for nine months. King’s bean-centric diet actually helped him strip 140 pounds from his massive frame.

Let’s close this list with a creepy diet that actually seems to have worked. Neil King was a Halstead man who was told to diet after his weight ballooned to 420 pounds. When his doctor told him he was at risk for bowel cancer, King cut out almost every aspect of his traditional English breakfast but one — baked beans. He ate beans for breakfast, lunch and dinner, sometimes with a little rice or potato — and nothing else for nine months. King’s bean-centric diet actually helped him strip 140 pounds from his massive frame.